FullMoon Panic
by Rally Collins
Summary: The people of Onikitsuen Village are being picked off one by one and they free their guardian Oni to protect them.


Author: Rally  
Date: June 2, 2005

Disclaimer: Oro? Rurouni Kenshin doesn't belong to me? Even though I changed the characters into monsters and villagers and everything? No? Well, if you say so. Then, Rurouni Kenshin must be property of Nobuhiro Watsuki, SHUEISHA, AnimeWorks & VIZ. The insert song "Sacrifice" was written by me. Please do not reproduce it in any form without my permission.

A/N: This story was an assignment from Sailor Guardian. The assignment was to write a horror featuring Kenshin as a Werewolf. Not sure it's really that scary, but I like it anyway.

**FullMoon Panic**

A banshee scream fit to make blood freeze echoed through the angry trees of the forest, tearing its way into Onikitsuen and through the walls of Megumi's home. She huddled her two very small children beneath her arms, lightly cooing a lullaby to calm their trembling. She kissed each of the boys on the tops of their heads in a comforting gesture.

Another would die tonight. That would make fifty-seven deaths. If any more villagers were lost, the town would be doomed. Megumi sealed her eyes and prayed the victim was female.

* * *

The meeting of Onikitsuen elders included the entire adult population of the village and the gathering was less than twenty strong. Six women faced a panel of seven men. 

Elder Gensai Ichi held up a hand for silence. "We have no time to grieve for the loss of our dearest relatives." His voice was strong. It belied the sorrow burrowed deep into his soul over the loss of the latest victim, his beloved wife. "We must act quickly. The full moon is upon us. I am not willing to put this to a vote. As Elder I say that we will release the Hitokiri. The guardian is our only hope for survival."

Megumi stepped forward. "The women are in agreement elder. We cannot afford to loose another man and we can ill afford to depend on the next victim being a woman. These oni will not stop until the town is bathed in the blood of all the villagers."

There were nods of assent all around. "Very well, then," said Elder Gensai. "Tonight at sunset we shall perform the Unsealing."

* * *

Lightning raced across the black clouds choking back the last remaining rays of sunlight. Another flash illuminated the blood-red tori'i of the Mitsurugi shrine casting a sinister shadow on the congregation of men and women gathered around a thousand year old God Tree. The steady rhythm of a simple skin drum beat out the pulse of the very earth. 

The seven remaining men of Onikitsuen Village circled the God Tree, arms splayed out as if to embrace it. Facing away were four women, each positioned at a compass point outside of the circle of males.

"Kita! Mizu!"(1) the woman facing north shouted in synch with the drumbeat. The clouds tore open, spilling rain only on the circle of men.

"Minami! Tsuchi!"(2) shouted the one facing east. The tree splintered into a cage formation revealing a shadow crouching in the center.

"Higashi! Hi!"(3) cried the southern woman. This time the cage exploded in flame.

"Nishi! Kaze!"(4) yelled the last of the compass points. A gale smashed the flame aside allowing the rain to finish off the smouldering wood.

"Bind!" cried the men as one. The falling water exploded into a dance of light and then coalesced into a swarm of silver chains that surrounded the shadowed figure looming within the ruins of the God Tree. "Bind!" the men cried again. The chains contracted around the shadow's throat. "Bind!" They clapped their hands together in a siff armed movement and took one step together. The rain-light flashed once more and in it's wake the men all held two-meter poles connected to the shadow's sliver collar.

"Bind!" Darkness and silence hit like an iron gong.

* * *

From out of the blackness came a clear voice. It sang quietly of the moon. It sang boldly of the mist. It sang sadly of sacrifice as it grew closer.

* * *

Megumi placed one foot in front of the other, each step like a knife stabbing into her skull. Her voice played out her own requiem and she could do--she would do--nothing to strangle its sound. 

This night,  
Cold night,  
Cold-hearted moon,  
Give me back my lost years.

This mist,  
Light mist,  
Light of illusion,  
Holding back my wet tears.

My life,  
Short life,  
Life with much sorrow,  
Will push back our dark fears.

The last line of the requiem brought the girl past the outer line of men and into reach of the shadow. This she could not see, but feel. When she felt it's breath caress her cheek, she spoke. "Take me. I am yours."

Lightning flashed burning into Megumi's mind the image of glowing amber orbs, staring death and hair red as blood, soaked and dripping with real blood mixed with rain. And then the screaming began.

* * *

The endless grey of nothingness wore on for centuries. The Hitokiri knew. He kept the years counted, slashed out on his own forearms, legs, neck, back, chest and belly. This year he would move on to his head. It was a shame. He really didn't want to destroy his face. It was already marred by a large cross scar, but good looks were all he had left. A sword that had nothing to cut, but his own flesh was worthless and only the true gods knew that his mind was long gone. So, it was with a sluggish mind that he heard the commands of the Unsealing. 

"Kita! Mizu!" At first, he swatted at the grey, trying to beat back the sound assulting his ears.

"Minami! Tsuchi!" The grey exploded into darkness and flying daggers of his mortal cage's life.

"Higashi! Hi!" The splinters errupted into flame, but were quickly doused by water from the sky. The Hitokiri's brain supplied a word for him. Rain. If there was rain then the nothingness had been banished and he was free.

"Nishi! Kaze!" A blast of wind knocked him into the smoking rubble, but the Hitokiri climbed to his feet. He was free and someone would pay for imprisoning him. Anyone would do. Anyone.

"Bind!" The Hitokiri was frozen by a burst of light and he was powerless to react to the next three calls of binding or their results. His few precious seconds of freedom had lead him right back to the silver noose. If it were possible for him to move, he would have torn every man, woman or child in the vincinity to shreds. He would have destroyed his captors.

But they were all out of reach. He could smell their proximity. He could smell their fear and when a voice rose up, he could smell the most fear of them all. The young woman paced slowly, so slowly, toward him. Before she even crossed the circular barrier into his territory, the Hitokiri knew she was young and fresh, with two toddling boys and that her husband had either deserted her or was dead. She was terrified and that made him very glad, indeed, because he could finally remember this part of the Unsealing Ceremony and he knew what role the girl was playing.

She stopped close enough to him that he would barely have to reach out to touch her and she spoke. "Take me. I am yours."

Light seared the sky, illuminating his offering. A rumbling began from deep in his chest and burst forth in a flurry of sword slashes that would leave the girl broken, bleeding and incapable of moving but still alive to suffer more torment from his blade. The sound that escaped her body was the shattering scream only produced upon the cliffs of death and it drove the Hitokiri insane with addiciton. He slashed on and on until the scream became a gurgle and the gurgle became silence. Drunk on the scent and feel of blood, he brought his blade up for a quick taste just as the moon broke through the blackness.

* * *

Elder Gensai fell back several steps, dropping both leather-bound drumsticks. Everywhere there was so much... redness. So, much death for only one sacrifice. A pool of blood collected at the feet of the guardian oni. It reflected the Hitokiri's inhuman stare, giving the elder a double dose of the demon once called Manslayer, like a devil from hell and his evil twin. 

"Elder?" someone whispered. "Elder Gensai?"

Ichi turned to the speaker. It was little Tsubame. She was only thirteen and frightened out of her wits, but she was still in control enough to give her elder a little mental restart. Gensai took a second to berate himself his behavior before stepping closer to the oni.

"Hitokiri Battousai! We of the Onikisuen have called you out of your imprisonment with words of power! We of the Onikitsuen have called you to us with the blood of the village! We of the Onikitsuen have called you here for protection with the life and words of the people!" He raised a steady finger to the Hitokiri. "You have heard our call! You have accepted our offering! You must obey us our wishes!"

The Hitokiri looked up, eyes blazing, blood parting his visage into a shattered mask, and smiled slightly. "You call me forth to obey you?" His words hit like ice. "Few men before you have dared such a thing and none of them survived." He raised his sword.

"Bind!" cried the elder. The oni dropped his precious blade and froze in place. "You will do as we say," said Gensai in as neutral tone as he could manage.

"Or what?"

"Or your forest will be destroyed and you along with it. We called you from the tree to protect us from that which is killing your forest and our people, alike. You will help us to help yourself."

"Very well, human. What must be done?"

* * *

Foolish humans, these.

* * *

A shadow streamed through the trees of the forest, raising none of the underbrush, rustling none of the leaves. Silence running. It covered every inch of the wood, every creek, every nook, every clearing until at last it came to a gradual halt some twenty yards from the village stockade. It wanted an audience for this. 

"Come out, harpy," he said casually. "Come out, fox. Come out, kelpie. We've much work to do."

Three forms broke away from the image of the forest. The first decended on wings to alight before her master. She reached out a waxy hand, bowing deeply, matted locks staying firmly pasted to her bare back and breasts. "Karou," the Hitokiri breathed accepting her hand and placing on it a kiss of welcome.

The next form was that of a young boy. He paced slowly away from the gloom with his arms spread wide, a green aura around him growing more intense with each step until he burst into emerald flame and lept into the arms of the Hitokiri in the form of a fox. "Yahiko." The Hitokiri stroked the red furred head before handing it off to the harpy.

The final of the quartet trotted towards his master on four equestrian legs, half man, half horse, all giant. He bent his front knees in the approximation of a deep bow and was rewarded with a hand on his head. "Zanza."

The Hitokiri nodded to each of his companions in turn. "You've orchestrated this moment from the very second of my imprisonment and you've done a fine job. You deserve a reward. What say you?" All three cried out, a hellish mixture of bark, whinny and scream. The Hitokiri smiled. "Zanza, would you mind terribly clearing out those pesky clouds? I'm feeling the need of a little Moonshine."

Zanza stamped a hoof and called out to the skies. On the next stamp of a hoof the clouds shattered, revealing the whole of the moon, a perfect orb of silver.

"Perfect," said the Hitokiri, but the word quickly changed into a growl low in his chest and he doubled over. After but a moment, the Hitokiri streached out the four paws of his wolf form and howled, viciously shaking off the silver collar, shucking the humans' control over him. Together again, at last. Earth, Wind, Fire and Water descended on the village in the guise of Death.

* * *

"Tae! Tae, I'm telling you there was something wrong with that ceremony." Tsubame pulled her hair back and tied it while rounding up another of the little tykes left in the care of the Akabeko. 

"Tsubame, hon, I can't blame ya fer worryin'. It's just- The elder knew what he was doin'. Do ya think he'da put us in more danger on the promise of savin' th' village?"

The young girl didn't even think about her answer. "Yes. He's a fool. Always has been. Megu was the only one who saw that in him besides me." She'd finally caught the energetic runt and handed him to the woman in the cellar.

"An' even _she_ went along with ol' geezer's plan," argued the older woman, handing off another of the squirmy children.

"Tae, you were there." Tsubame dropped her voice down to a whisper. "You saw what that thing did to Megu. You saw how it looked at the elder, at the men. It doesn't intend to let any of us live through the night."

Tae lifted up her hand in protest when the first demonic cry cracked the night. She redirected her arm to nab the final child and bolted for the cellar, snatching Tsubame on the way down all before the unearthly sound died out. "Tsuba, you're in charge! Y'all others, keep these kids _quiet_! And don't come out, no matter what ya hear." Tae flew out of the cellar, dropping the door down, sealing the children in darkness.

* * *

The first thing Tae noticed when she exited the tea shop was that the stockade was on fire. Most of the remaining adult villagers, and some of the older boys, were gathered in the court. She caught a hold of the first one she got to, turning him by the shoulders to face her. It was the Elder. "What's happening?" 

"The Hitokiri- Hitokiri- It's free!" he babbled, eyes glazed with fear.

"What's free?" Tae tried again, shaking the old man, trying to instill some sense back into him.

He looked directly into Tae's eyes and smiled. "The Hitokiri Battousai is free," the elder said conversationally. "We're all going to die." And then he broke out in hysterical laughter.

Tae shoved him away, snatching her next target. "What happened?"

The young warrior Aoshi peeled her fingers off of his arm before responding. "The Hitokiri gathered the oni from the forest and is now attacking us. Somehow, he's slipped our control. I'm taking the boys and we're going to try to stop them. You stay with the babies. If we fall..." He looked into her eyes for just a moment.

"I know," she said daring to squeeze his hand quickly. "I know what to do."

"Go," he directed, snapping his head for emphasis. She took off.

* * *

"Men!" Aoshi was perched atop an empty wagon, one of his katana to the sky, his voice cutting through the roar of the flames and through the ever increasing cries of the devils. "We must stop this menace that we've unleashed upon ourselves. We must or we all will die. Our _children_ will die." He had no children of his own, but the few that still lived were everyone's. "We must live! Show no mercy!"

* * *

"Show no mercy," laughed the Hitokiri, around a mouthfull of flesh, flesh of a young man's neck. "Destroy them all!" 

Behind him, Zanza had finally kicked away enough of the burning wall to allow Kaoru through without igniting the flammable oils coating her body. Yahiko had already gone ahead, bounding from rooftop to rooftop, spreading the blaze.

* * *

Three of the fiends were in sight. Aoshi waved his men onward, his personal target already in sight. He broke into a sprint, aiming for the wolf.

* * *

"They're loosing!" 

"Shh!" hushed Tae, slapping a hand over the younger girl's mouth. "There's no way to tell that from here."

Tsubame yanked the offending hand off. "The building above us is burning. We've heard nothing but the screams of our fallen and for the last ten minutes, not even that! The men have lost!"

Tae fingered the object she had concealed under her yukata. "If the men have lost, then I've no other choice."

"Tae?" Tsubame took a step back from her dear friend. "What are you talking about?"

* * *

"Look around you," the Hitokiri ordered. "All your people are dead. You've killed yourselves." 

Aoshi did not look. He would not take his focus off of the Hitokiri even for a second. He would personally see to the survival of his town, of his friends.

"Let me make this easier on you." It was a cryptic remark, but Aoshi wasn't left wondering for long. The Hitokiri nodded to the kelpie and the kelpie responded by wickering at the sky. A cloud blurred out the light of the moon and when the man looked back to the demon leader the Hitokiri had resumed the form of a man. "There is a reason I am known as the Hitokiri Battousai." He drew his sword. The blade flashed the light of the burning buildings. It reflected the gazes of the three oni spectators. "Defeat me and I shall spare your children."

Aoshi nodded and then launched himself at the Battousai.

* * *

"Tae, no! Stop it! Don't hurt them, Tae!" Tsubame had the babies behind her, squashed into the back corner of the cellar. Some of the older ones had taken up positions just behind the teenager. The other woman was already dead, Tae's first victim. "Tae, what's gotten in to you?" 

Tears coated the older woman's cheeks shiny. She held the short sword before her like a burning branch. "Move, Tsuba! This is best for them! Those creatures will show no mercy! Ya must let me prevent that!"

"I won't let you kill them!"

"You've little choice and neither do I."

* * *

Aoshi was down to one katana. He was also down to one arm, the other had taken a disabling blow and was now nothing more than dead weight. Bad choice of words. 

"I smell fresh blood. That wouldn't be your precious children, would it?" Aoshi couldn't supress a twitch. "You had a doomsday plan, didn't you?" The Battousai laughed. "All this battling, all this fighting and that which you seek to protect is now dying. It's perfect!"

Aoshi attacked again, trying to beat silence into the demon, trying to silence the pounding of his own heart in his ears.

"It's delicious, but I cannot allow that woman to go any further. She is stealing my revenge. Now, I will end this!"

Aoshi countered, he got his blade up in time to meet the Battousai's. The katana parted like soft butter and the Battousai's blade continued through the young defender, the last man in Onikitsuen. Aoshi saw more than felt his body come apart into more pieces than was possible with just one strike of a blade.

* * *

Tsubame was gone. As were most of the older children. Tae looked down to her hands. There was a red haze over her vision, but she noticed that they were crying. She couldn't hear it, but she could see it, a bundle of babies, huddled together, wailing their hearts out and the only one who could protect them, with murder on her mind. 

Murder? No, it was mercy. She forced her body one step closer.

"So, you are the one. You've stolen my vengence." The voice was bland, not as accusatory as the words indicated. Tae had heard this voice before. She knew who was behind her. She knew _what_ was behind her. She raised her blade. Perhaps she could take three or four more of them with her before he struck. "Stop!" She froze only momentarily, but then swung out. Her swing was halted by a belly full of metal. Tae watched the blade in perfect belief as it twisted and exited out the side of her body. And then there was nothing.

* * *

The young girl gasped into awareness, into a nightmare of blood, but she was alive and gathered into a corner were seven _living_ children. She put a hand over her bleeding stomach and crawled up the wall to face the man standing near the exit. 

"I do not kill children," he said. Tsubame wasn't sure if it was directed at her or not. "Unfortunately, you are still a child, girl." This time he did look at her. "Let this be a lesson to you. My vengence has been sated. Don't let this happen again." He didn't turn and walk out of the cellar, the Hitokiri Battousai just vanished, leaving Tsubame wondering about his words.

Let _what_ be a lesson to her? Don't let _what_ happen again? The slaughter? How?

One of the infants began crying. That ripped it. Tsubame fell to caring for the ones who needed her. It would be days before she had time to reflect upon those words again. Perhaps there was a meaning to be discovered in them.

The End

* * *

Translations:  
1. "Kita! Mizu!"  
North! Water! 

2. "Minami! Tsuchi!"  
East! Earth!

3. "Higashi! Hi!"  
South! Fire!

4. "Nishi! Kaze!"  
West! Wind!


End file.
